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The ColorPlus printer driver is designed
for developers and end users to build document imaging, e-commerce,
archiving, faxing, or raster image capturing applications by
converting any printable file into a supported image format. The ColorPlus
driver is based entirely on Black Ice Printer Driver technology
which has been in use since 1989, and is not based on Microsoft
Mini-driver technology.
The Black Ice ColorPlus PDF printer drivers combines the Black
Ice Color
and Black Ice
PDF
printer drivers into a single document conversion printer driver
which includes the functionality of both products.
Free Resource
ToolKit is shipped with every printer driver purchased, to easily
integrate the printer driver into the developed application.
Supported operating
systems (terminal services MUST NOT be present):
-
Windows Vista
32bit
-
Windows XP Home and Professional
-
Windows 2000 Professional
-
Windows 2000 Server
-
Windows 2000 Advanced Server
-
Windows NT 4.0
The ColorPlus printer
driver features are grouped into the following main parts:
Each of the above
feature groups' settings can be changed from the printer driver's
Printing Preferences dialog.
The Device Settings
Paper Size
The ColorPlus printer
driver supports a total of 84 different paper sizes.
-
45 standard paper (page) sizes
are supported.
-
36 Advanced paper sizes are supported,
including the A0 Engineering paper size.
-
3 Black Ice paper sizes, such as
User-selectable variable (custom) paper size
specified in inches or millimeters, fax paper size and variable
paper size in pixels.
-
Users can add new paper sizes, customize
existing paper sizes, and remove unwanted paper sizes.
Force
Fax Resolution
Select this option to force the
ColorPlus
printer driver to generate faxable images, regardless of the settings
of the printing application. Faxable images must have 204x98 or
204x196 DPI resolution and must have a 1728 pixel width. The Black
Ice Printer will generate the output image with the required parameters,
therefore no further modification of the image will be necessary
in order to fax the image.
Page
Orientation
Besides the traditional
Portrait and Landscape orientations, Black Ice ColorPlus printers support
the "Rotate landscape image to portrait" option too. This
feature is very handy when landscape oriented documents need to
be faxed.
By using this option, the document
will be printed using the landscape orientation and then the image
will be rotated to portrait orientation and is ready to be faxed.
Graphic resolutions
The Black Ice ColorPlus
Printer Drivers support for the following resolutions:
-
100 x 100 DPI
-
200 x 200 DPI
-
204 x 98 DPI - the Standard FAX
mode (Draft)
-
204 x 196 DPI - the Fine FAX mode
(Low)
-
300 x 300 DPI
-
600 x 600 DPI
-
Cutom resolution
- up to 3000x3000 DPI
The custom resolution can be set to
any value ( horizontal and vertical ) up to 3000 x 3000 DPI and
not less then 50 x 50 DPI
File Formats
Settings
Use these settings
to specify the output file format for the ColorPlus printer driver to
generate. The printed documents will be converted to images which
will be stored in the selected format
File Format
Printed documents
can be converted into the following formats:
Create file in memory
By using this option
all images will be created in memory. An application can receive
the image created in the memory by the printer driver using the
printer driver's messaging interface.
Color Depth
The ColorPlus printer
driver can convert the printed documents into 24 bit (true color),
8 bit (256 color or grayscale) or 1 bit (monochrome) images.
Multipage file support
The Black Ice
ColorPlus
printer driver can convert multipage documents in one of two ways:
by generating one separate image file for each page, or by generating
one single multipage TIFF or DCX file. Using the multipage
file support, all pages from the source document will be stored
in the same image file.
Write text file
- Generate text output
If the source document
contains text information, the printer driver can extract
and save the text from the document in a separate text file in addition
to creating the image file(s). Click
Here for additional text extraction information.
Save position and
style - for text output
This powerful feature
allows exact reconstruction of a document. When this option is selected,
the exact position of the text and the font information from the
source document will be saved in a text file.
Mail Merge
The mail merge feature
is available in the printer driver, call for details.
Photo Quality (Dithering)
In order to convert
color documents into monochrome (black and white) or 8 bit (256
color) images, several dithering methods are available and can be
used. The Color printer driver support seven different dithering
methods.
The size and appearance of the generated
image will vary depending on which dithering method is used.
Filename Generation
Settings
The Filename generation
settings allow the name of the generated images to be specified.
The Black Ice printer driver supports seven different filename
generation methods:
These filename generation methods provide
huge flexibility to the application which integrates the printer
driver.
-
Use the prefix and extension:
the output filename will be generated from random characters.
The first three characters will be the characters specified in
the ‘Filename Prefix’ edit box and random numbers
will be added.
-
Prefix and extension from
the registry:
The file name prefix and the extension will be read from the specified
registry key.
-
Prefix and extension from
the INI file:
In this case the filename and the prefix will be read from the
specified INI file. The driver will search in the INI file for
a printer name section. Use the “File Name Prefix"
key for the file prefix and the “File Name extension"
key for the extension.
-
Exact filename:
The printed file will be generated with the exact name as specified
in the ‘Enter the filename’ edit box.
-
Exact filename from the
registry:
The filename will be read from the specified registry key.
-
Exact filename from the
INI file:
In this case the filename will be read from the specified INI
file.
-
Use the document name:
The driver will use the document name which the application passes
to the driver when generating the name of the output image.
Output
Directory
The
printer driver will generate the image file(s) in the specified
folder. This folder can be on the local hard drive, can be a mapped
network drive, or it can be a folder on another computer.
Group
File Options
For
every print job (printed document) the printer driver creates
a "group file". The group file contains information about
the generated image, including the name of the document, the full
path and file name for each page, the image format, color depth,
paper size, orientation, and printing status.
Delete
the group file after printing
- The printer driver will automatically delete the group file at
the end of the printing. Applications can still use the information
from the group file during printing.
Disable group file generation - If it is not needed,
the group file generation can be turned off.
Start
Application Settings
One
of the features of the Black Ice printer drivers is that the
printer driver can start an application before or after printing.
If the application is started before the printing starts, the applications
can wait for the messages sent by the printer driver. When the application
is started after the printing has finished, a custom application
can read the command line parameters of the generated group file,
which will contain all of the necessary information about the generated
images.
The
order of the parameters passed to the started application can be
changed, and unnecessary parameters can be removed from the parameter
list.
Watermark
Settings
Add
a watermark image to every printed document using the Print Watermark
feature of the Black Ice printer drivers. The selected image
(your company logo, signature, etc.) will show up automatically
on the generated images.
-
Watermark image file:
If needed, two different watermark images can be specified for
portrait and landscape orientation images.
-
Position:
The watermark can be placed on the
document using four options:
-
Brightness:
controls the visibility of the watermark
image on the original document.
The watermark is always in the background,
so the document's text and images are clearly visible.
Embedded Annotation
Settings
It is possible to define a custom annotation text that will be placed
on every printed page. The annotation text can also contain the
current date and/or the time. The format of the date and time, the
position of the annotation text on the page, and the font used to
print the annotation can be fully customized. The Black Ice
printer drivers can also add user specific annotations such as the
printing user name, computer name, IP Address, etc. which can be
specified using predefined fields and environment variables.
Profile
Manager
A printer driver profile stores every printer setting at a given
moment. This means that one can have separate profiles for different
applications and switching from one application to another means
that another printer driver profile should be loaded. Users do not
have to know what settings the application requires and they do
not have to make printer settings changes manually. They simply
select another profile from the profile list and the printer driver
will make all the necessary changes automatically.
Bates Numbering
Bates numbering is a unified
way to refer to and track documents and pages by number rather than
name. Bates number is normally a series of letters followed by
sequential numbers which are incremented for each printed page.
Bates Numbering is mostly used by law firms to aid in the
referencing of documents.
The Bates Numbering provided
by Black Ice Software is composed of two components: prefix and
number. The prefix can be any string including letters and numbers,
such as a case number, client name, etc. The second part of the
Bates Number, the actual number, will be incremented for each
printed page. The user can specify a starting number that will be
incremented by the driver automatically for each printed page.
Advanced
features and technologies
Black Ice printer drivers support several features and technologies that no
other printer driver vendor supports. In order to make use of these
technologies, there are several applications included in the Resource
Toolkit that demonstrate these features.
The following list
enumerates these Black Ice specific technologies. Please click on
the links below to get more information about these features.
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ColorPlus Printer Drivers for Windows XP/2000/NT/Vista32 |